Page 99 of Last Night

‘Where else would you make eye contact other than at head level, fucks sake?’

‘Hahaha. Well now you’re asking.’

I risk a glance at Finlay’s furious, blushing face. He must still go to the gym as I’ve not seen a chest like that anywhere except in magazines bought by Justin.

‘What was it you want to say?’

‘Do you want my coat?’ I say, tweaking at the red fur hood.

‘No I do fucking not! Key card, now!’ Fin says and I guffaw. The more indignant he gets, the funnier thisCarry On and Don’t Try to Glimpse My Willyskit gets.

‘If you say so, it was a generous offer. It’d be me landed with the dry cleaning bill if you rubbed your goolies on it,’ I say, hooting as I turn and retreat the way I came.

I snigger all the way down in the lift, across the lobby, and even when I’m asking for another key card, and explaining the contretemps.

‘We can send a staff member to open it,’ says the lipstick woman, dubious about casually running off spare room key cards.

‘I think it had better be me, or he’ll go off on one about his privacy. Seriously, please don’t get me in that much trouble,’ I plead.

After a short negotiation where she needs to be reassured that Fin and I checked in together by tapping on keyboards and calling up records, and I’m safe to be given access to his room, she produces an envelope with a card.

I head back up again, stillsmiling.

‘Where did you go for it, fucking Delhi?!’ Fin shrieks as I round the corner and I collapse, bent double laughing.

‘Stop being angry while naked, it’s too funny, ahahahhaa.’ I pass the card to him and Fin snatches it with his free hand.

‘This is going to be a dance of the veils, eh,’ I say, as I realise Fin’s got to somehow twist round to use the card while staying behind his towel. And when he opens the door, the towel will drop?

‘Yes, which is why you’re going to turn around, please,’ Fin says.

‘We are all naked under our clothes, nothing to be ashamed of,’ I mock sigh, while turning my back.

A moment later, I hear a small commotion, swearing and a female shriek behind me, and turn to see two sixty-something women clutching each other. There’s a fraction of a second’s blur of pink, as an unclothed Fin disappears into the room and the door slams shut behind him.

‘That was an unexpected treat!’ whoops one of the women. ‘Better than dress circle seats atMamma Mia!’

‘What a lucky girl you are,’ says the other.

We drive to Leith in a mostly terse silence with the radio blaring Pulp. It’s a shame it’s ‘Do You Remember the First Time?’ as it immediately feels like discomfiting commentary. Nevertheless I suspect Fin and I are in the kind of atmosphere where anything other than ‘Hi Ho Silver Lining’ would seem loaded with subtext. Probably even that.

We park up and Finlay’s phone points us to his uncle’s old place, a five-minute walk. It’s much smaller than the family home, a simple, boxy but appealing stone two-bed terrace. It reminds me of my house.

I comment on the disparity with the last property.

‘Yeah. Remember my grandad’s addictive personality? Uncle Don had it worse, and with less money to squander,’ Fin says. ‘Horses were his thing. Leith’s taken off since he bought here so his house probably shot up in value.’

‘He didn’t marry? Or have kids?’

‘No, used to say he couldn’t afford to. He was probably right.’

We’ve knocked the brass knocker on the mint-green peeling door but the occupants of Uncle Don’s former residence either aren’t home or don’t want to speak to us.

‘What did he and your dad fall out over?’ I ask, as we walk back to the main street.

‘Money. My grandad predeceased my grandma, and there was an almighty ruck between the siblings about which care home she should go into and whether she even should go into a care home. Don inevitably had a very keen eye on what he expected from my grandad’s estate and was in favour of my gran going budget. The siblings always seemed a tinder box, to be honest. I don’t remember being surprised when we stopped coming up to Edinburgh in the school holidays.’

We wander down the quayside and I ooh and aah at the interesting-looking independent shops and trendy places to eat and drink. Finlay walks with hands thrust in coat pockets, engaging with me only when he’s prompted. A drizzling rain starts, and I put my hood up.

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